Chapter 97 Dawn’s Edge
Malia’s POV
I’m wrapped in warmth like a blanket of skin and breath and small heart beats. I rouse slowly, the type of slowness that comes with when your body doesn’t want to stop wherever it’s been concealed. My cheek is resting on something plush—someone's hoodie, perhaps—and there’s a rhythmic motion beneath my hand that isn’t my own.
I blink.
The living room is awash in the soft gray light of the very early morning, the light that can’t quite make up its mind if it is night or day. The TV is on, frozen on the menu screen, silently looping and illuminating faint blue flashes over the chaos we created last night.
Popcorn kernels litter the carpet like fallen stars. Crumpled soda cans rest against one another on the coffee table. A half-consumed slice of pizza sits forgotten on a paper plate, the cheese hardened into something nearly artisanal.
And then I see them.
Rowan is splayed on his back closest to the couch, one arm slung over his eyes, mouth slightly parted, snoring so quietly it’s almost charming. His flannel is bunched up revealing strip of stomach that heaves with each breath.
Aiden is huddled on his side a few feet away, legs pulled in, face buried in the bend of his arm like he’s protecting himself even in sleep. His hair is a mess—dark strands fall across his forehead—and one hand is still loosely clenched like he’d been grabbing for something when he at last passed out.
They are all on the floor. Around me.
Like sentries who refused to leave when exhaustion took the win.
Boys.
I was already smiling before I realized—so small and secret and sweet and so painfully good that yes, I might cry. I don’t know when I fell asleep here on this couch. I can still hear us laughing so hard it hurt to breathe, feel Cian’s arm wrapped around me, Rowan’s utterly absurd victory jig after he finally won at Mario Kart, Aiden’s quiet fingertips mapping the outlines of my wrist as we collectively watch explosions disintegrate another city on the high belligerent screen.
I remember feeling… safe. I move with care, so as not to rouse anyone. My bladder is protesting, loudly. Bathroom. Right.
I get up from the couch, my bare feet making no sound on the rug. It’s cooler, darker, down the hall. I make my way down the hall, past the ajar door of Cian’s room where his bed is still made perfectly because none of us really made it that far last night.
The bathroom light was too bright. I wince, turning it off again, and letting only the dim dawn light from the tiny frosted window lead me. I get up, wash my hands, then raise my eyes to the mirror.
My reflection stares back.
Hairs tangled, cheeks flushed from sleep and laughter, eyes more awake than they have been in weeks. There’s a small hickey blossoming a little below my collarbone–courtesy of Aiden’s mouth some time at two o’clock in the morning–and I touch it absent-mindedly, grinning at the memory.
I look… happy.
The smile broadens.
I lean in, examining the faint shadows beneath my eyes that look a little less harsh this morning. The way my lips are still curved from laughing last night. The tiny freckle on my left cheek that Aiden always kisses like it’s a secret he’s proud to know.
For once the girl in the mirror doesn’t look like she’s been through hell. She looks like someone who might actually belong somewhere.
I exhale through my nostrils a little, and the glass fogs up momentarily.
And then— Pain.
Sharp, sudden. A spike kissed straight through my temple. My vision fractures and my head spun.
The mirror ripples like water. My reflection distorts—eyes too wide, pupils blown out black, mouth contorts into some kind of strange figure. I grasp the sink, my knuckles turning white.
Voices. Not mine. Not theirs!
Scattered, overlapping. From all corners, but also from nowhere. She doesn’t belong! Weak!!
Silver claws, faceless. Always faceless.
My head pounds harder. I put my palms to my temples and try to push the sound away as the increasingly louder noise.
Something is shifting beneath my skin. Restless.
Hot, alive. There’s a growl rising from my chest—low, primal, not normal.
I grab my head, “Argg!”
They burn. I look down, claws. Not nails. Claws!
Black. Curved. Razor sharp. Pressing into the skin of my fingertips as if they’ve been waiting. Blood wells in thin strips. Electricity runs through the pain, searing.
I scream again. Or try to. The sound comes out stifled, guttural. My knees give out.
I fold to the floor, my back slamming against the cabinet. The claws scratch the floor as they make scratches. My back arches. My wolf—something inside me—thrashes around, desperate, trying to break free. Bones grind. Muscles seize.
The voices swell. Run. They’ll leave you, they always leave.
I scratch at my own throat to stop the change, to hold it back. My vision narrows—dark at the peripheral, crimson in the focal. The mirror behind me reveals a beast: fangs lengthening, eyes shining molten gold, hair flowing beneath skin as oil on water.
No. No no no—
Now the tile is cold against my cheek, my body curled fetal. Every heartbeat feels like it’s cracking ribs. My wolf barks from inside my head knocking against the bone. I taste copper—blood after I bite my tongue. The walls are spinning, the room is breathing, like lungs. I can smell it: sweat-fear, metal, the acute ozone flavor of something breaking.
I’m breaking. I’m losing.
They are going to come upon me like this — clawed and fanged and utterly alien — and that is what I want them to see, what I’ve known all along: I don’t fit. I never did.
The voices now laugh, enmeshed and barbed.
I close my eyes tightly, willing it to stop, willing myself to remain normal, to remain me…
“Malia!”
The exclamation pierces the murk. I snap open my eyes.
I’m on the couch. My heart is pounding so hard it hurts, sweat drenches my shirt. Dawn light spills stronger now, painting the room with soft pinks and golds.
Cian is kneeling in front of me, his hands close to my shoulders but not touching—as if he’s scared I’ll break if he makes contact.
His eyes are wide and apprehensive, looking at my face.
“Hey,” he says softly. “Hey, you’re okay. It was a dream. Just a dream.”
I breathe in as if I've been under water.
My hands— Normal, no claws. no claw. No blood. Just trembling fingers.
I look behind him.
Rowan and Aiden are still asleep on the floor, right where they were. Rowan’s snoring has paused mid-inhale; Aiden hasn’t moved.
It was a dream, but it felt so real. The pain, the voices, the shift. I place my hand to my chest as I listen to the frantic thump of my heart.
Cian watches me closely. “You were whimpering,” he says quietly. “Then you started shaking. I didn’t want to wake you too fast, but… you screamed.”
I swallow. My throat is sore.“Sorry.”
“Don’t.” He shakes his head. “Don’t apologize.”
He extends slowly, sweeping sweat-soaked hair from my forehead. His touch feels like ice on my burning skin.
“You wanna take a walk?” he asks. Voice gentle. Careful. “Just you and me. Get some air. Clear your mind.”
I look at him.
Nothing but the suite’s stillness and the quiet breathing from the floor could be heard in the room. Rowan twitches once in his sleep. Aiden’s hand moves as if he’s grabbing for something now.
Cian’s gaze does not leave mine. There’s no pressure in them, just patience.
I open my mouth but I can’t get any words out.
The question lingers between us, still unanswered, as the first real sunlight of dawn streams through the blinds and falls on his face…